Human Spin the Bottle

This activity was pretty fun. I used it to review two songs. I had different ways to sing laid out in a circle in two different colors. Yellow was Army of Helaman and Green was The Holy Ghost. I spun a kid around in a chair and sang the song that it landed on the way that it said to sing it. It was a great way to review. Junior primary got a kick out of it. Senior Primary got a little rowdy when we did it. They started to cheer when it landed on boys alone. Next time I need to start out by reminding them that we are in church. It's alright to enjoy seeing where someone is going to land, but we need to remember where we are. For Senior Primary I als had the person sitting in the chair say the next few words of the song, it was an extra added challenge that the kids enjoyed.

Wiggle

I found a great wiggle activity for Do As I'm Doing. I found on the Divine Secrets of a Primary Chorister Blog. I printed out and laminated a bunch of circles with really great activites on them. There are about 20 of them like Russian Dancing, The Chiken Dance, Kung Foo Fighting, Jump Rope, Swimming. The kids particularly liked Flex your Muscles. They had a lot of fun with it and it got their energy out. I'll try to put that link on here eventually.

Find The Book of Mormon(hot and cold)

This last Sunday we learned We'll Bring The World His Truth. I love this song and it was so fun to teach the kids. I started by showing them BOM in different languages and then I showed them a map of the world and explained that the gospel was taught all over the world. I had several mini BOM printed out in different languages. I asked a child to go in the hall and then asked another to hide one of the BOM around the room. When the child came back in we sang soft if they were far away and loud the closer they got. This was a simple activity that the kids loved, especially the senior primary. I have never seen them get so excited. This activity can be adapted to any song. I had the words of the song written on poster board because we have never done it before and by the end of class the kids knew the words to the song without having to look, it was great.

Picture Scramble

Today in primary we learned "The Holy Ghost." I used the idea that was mentioned in the Friend in 2005. For Junior Primary I started by singing through the song and clapping the beat. I then told them that beat was constant just like the Holy ghost is constant in our lives. I invited them to clap along with me as they listened to the words again. I then asked them questions about how the Holy Ghost helps us and they listened to the song again for the answers. I then put up pictures that I had printed out from sugardoodle.com. They have a lot of LDS clipart. I printed out discriptions of the main words. I put them up out of order and asked one of the older kids to come and put them in order while we sang that part of the song. I broke each verse in half so their was only six pictures to put in order. I then had them sing a few times, each time taking off a picture or two. By the end they sang the whole section without my help. This went over well. They enjoyed it and it went smoothly. The best part is I can use it again next week because we only made it through the first half of the first verse.

For the senior primary I sang through the song and had them listen to the words. I then gave them a quiz over the song. The questions were fairly straight forward, but I gave them a photo copy of the song after a few minutes. I then went over the questions. This wasn't my best idea, but it worked alright. I like to try and stretch the senior primary a bit. I want them to get excited and I feel they do better if I challenge them. I might do this again, but maybe have better questions or possibly questions they can look up in the scriptures that relate to the song in some way. I then had them put the pictures in order, but I put up pictures for the whole first verse(12). I had two kids come up to put them in order and we had to sing it a few times for them to get it. I then had the kids sing a couple of times, and then I slowly took the pictures of the board until there was none left. They also sang through the whole first verse without my help or the piano, which is pretty good for none of the kids knowing the song at the beginning. The pictures were fun for the senior primary as well and I would definitely do this again.

Name That Primary Tune

This week I introduced When I am Baptized on pg. 103. For Junior Primary I played Name That Primary Tune. I put ?'s on the board with who/what/where/when/and why underneath them. I then hid questions around the room that they needed to discover. Most of the questions fit under the who/what/where/when/why theme. When they answered the question I put a picture representing the answer under the corresponding question mark. I dressed up in a trench coat with a hat and magnifying glass to represent a detective. The kids had a good time with this. They got slightly out of control with shouting out the answers. I need to make sure they know they are supposed to raise their hand if they know the answer. I needed to be a little more organized with the pictures and where I put the questions and envelopes when they were done with them because they were laying on the table all over the place so it looked a little chaotic when I was done. Also it might be a bit more fun to have a coat for the kid, I gave them a hat, but some didn't like it as much and took it off early. It added to it being a little out of control.


After the game I assigned each class a line to learn to sing and gave them the corresponding picture. This was more difficult than I anticipated. This was my first time teaching a new song and the kids had a hard time learning it. I even had the teachers work on it individually for a while and the little ones still weren't catching on so when we went around the room to sing most of the kids weren't singing. This was too difficult for the junior primary.

For the Senior Primary I handed out a crossword puzzle with words from the song in it. I split up the classes using starbursts which was a good idea because it broke up the talkative kids. Unfortunately I don't think I can use candy all the time because the kids kept begging me for more and I used it all. It was good to mix it up, but I can't do it every Sunday or I'll be in the poor house. I had each group work on the crossword puzzle for 10 minutes and then try to guess what song it was. Everyone enjoyed it and most of the groups were able to figure out the song. It was very big success, it took awhile to make, but it was worth it.

I then used the same idea of assiging each class a line to learn how to sing. This went over much better in the Senior Primary. They caught on very quickly and then we sang it about 4 times, each time I challenged them sing it louder. The problem I have with the senior primary is getting them excited. They know the songs, but they barely move their lips to sing it. I kept challenging them to sing louder than I was. By the end they were almost there and it sounded really good.

Things I learned from this week were that it is hard to teach the junior primary new songs. I need to go over the song several times before I start changing things up with them. It might also help if I explain what some words meant, like ponder. For the senior primary I need to think of things to challenge them. They don't do well with repetition, and they need things that are a little more mature, but still fun.

The Church of Jesus Christ and Mother's Day

I am amazed by all of the ideas that other primary music leaders come up with. Hopefully after I get the hand of this I can start coming up with some on my own. This week I am reviewing I Belong to the Church of Jesus Christ and learning a Mother's Day song.

To review I am borrowing an idea from the Primary Singing Ideas blog. I am going to be doing a science experiment in primary, this should be exciting. I'm going to start by having a dry-erase board of the song up front written in different colors.


Then I'm going to put a tray on the table with 3 cups filled with 1/2 c water and 3 Tbs. vinegar. In front of the cups there will be 3 spoons with baking soda and 3 drops of food coloring, one red, one green, and one blue. I will have a child come to the front and mix a spoon in one of the glasses. After it is done fizzing it will be a color. I will then have a child come to the front and erase that color from the boards, eventually erasing the song.

I'm a little worried about having enough time to set this up between the two primaries, I guess I'll see how it goes.

I'm also going to be learning a Mother's Day song, Mother I Love You pg. 206. It was sprung on me last week that we needed to sing in Sacrament for mother's day. I should have realized this, but I'm still getting used to the calling. I believe the primary already knows this song so we are going to review it for the next two weeks. I will be doing the Mystery Mom. I got this idea from PerryParty3 on Primary Singing Ideas. I will take pictures of two mom's with kids in the primary. I will then print out 8x10's of them and put in a frame. I made a puzzle to hide their pictures. We will sing through the song and the child I hear singing the loudest can come and take a piece from the puzzle and see if they can guess who it is. I won't let them take the middle piece until the end. This is what my puzzle looks like:

For some reason this is sideways, I'll try and straighten it out later.
Hopefully these ideas will go well. I will post how they went so I can learn from my mistakes in the future:)

The science experiment went extremely well. The junior primary absolutely loved it. I had them sing through the song once before the experiment and said the best singer could come and help me. After we did the experiment once everyone was trying to sing their loudest so they could come up and help. I didn't know that junior primary could sing so well:) It also went well with the senior primary, but they weren't quite as excited because they had seen it done before, next time I will have to add some sort of twist. I had the kids put on lab coats and goggles and they got a kick out of it.

The mystery mom also went very well. We didn't finish in either primary so they have to wait for next week to find out who the mystery mom is and its killing them.

Getting Started

I was recently called as a Primary Chorister in my ward. I'm keeping this blog as a reference to the things I have done so I can look back and remember ideas. Not all of the ideas are mine. I'll reference others ideas if I have their information. I'll try to update weekly and then write a review of how it went. I'm excited to have this calling and look forward to teaching the children music.